Pre NCS London 2016: Things To Do + Events

by JONATHAN HSY

Bedside reading: guide to Pride in London (festivities just ended in June).
Patience Agbabi's Telling Tales, Lavinia Greenlaw's A Double Sorrow.

The International Medieval Congress in Leeds has just concluded, and the New Chaucer Society Congress in London is approaching!

Here's a quick post with a few items of note ahead of NCS (ITM readers will surely notice that many of these items are responding directly to current events and geopolitics).

The #femfog roundtable at the IMC in Leeds was an animated and productive venue that explored strategies for building a more inclusive and ethical medieval studies. Such conversations are sure to continue at NCS, whether through official sessions or informal venues. Fore more on the Leeds session:

• Check out this archive of tweets compiled by Shyama Rajendran.
• The Mittelalter bloggers have provided timely summaries of many IMC sessions (some in German, some in English), with a femfog session summary (in English) at the end of this post.

Topical reading list for medievalists. See Jeffrey's list of "reading for sustenance" (compiled on 2 July) including Brexit- and femfog-related items by medievalists. See also my posting on refuge and welcome (20 June), and two new items published yesterday (7 July):

• Simon Gaunt (King's College London) on “Europe” as an idea in the Middle Ages, on the Values of French project blog.

• Howard Hotson (Oxford) on medieval universities as institutions beyond nation-states, at the Times Higher Education.

Things to do in London before NCS:

• Chaucer's London Today. A guide to site of interest to Chaucerians around London (document posted by Lawrence Warner).

• The Refugee Tales. Walk and events conclude today (Friday).

• Protest march in Brixton. For people following ongoing developments in the US, consider this rally to be held in solidarity with victims of police brutality (Saturday).

Events associated with NCS:

• Queers & Allies. Informal social gathering for queer (LGBTQ+) medievalists and allies. Tuesday (12 July) starting 9pm at the Royal Oak (at 73 Columbia Road; this is about a 30 minute walk or 2 minutes by taxi from Queen Mary). [h/t to Anthony Bale and to the #QueerMSS crowd especially Diane Watt and Roberta Magnani]

• Safe(r) Spaces Conversation (moderated by Helen Young). “A Pilgrimage to Safe(r) Spaces: Classroom Crossroads of Identity,” Thursday (14 July) at 9-10:30am, Bancroft 1.13a. This event was created to center crip/queer experiences (e.g., issues relating to disability and sexuality), but will no doubt expand to incorporate many other identities.

Some events of note on the NCS program(me):

• The “Corporealities” thread explores facets of identity and experience in the medieval past and the present; note the highly topical "Pale Faces" session interrogating whiteness and medieval studies (Monday 11 July, 2pm, Arts 2 Lecture Theatre).

• Global Chaucers roundtable exploring translation, adaptation, and comparative literary approaches: "Translating Global Chaucers" (Wednesday 13 July at 9-10:30pm in PP1).

• Readings by neo-Chaucerian poets Lavinia Greenlaw (Tuesday 12 July at 5:30pm, People's Place Theatre) and Patience Agbabi (Wednesday 13 July at 8pm, Arts 2 Lecture Theatre).* [note also Jeffrey's post on other events that night]

*A brief blurb for the Patience Agbabi reading (not in the online version of NCS program):

Patience Agbabi is former Poet Laureate of Canterbury. Telling Tales (Canongate, 2014), in which she disperses Chaucerian narratives in present-day multiethnic London, was shortlisted for the Ted Hughes Award for New Work in Poetry. Her work appears also in the anthology The Refugee Tales (Comma Press, 2016). She will  deliver an interactive reading “Herkne and Rede” that explores poetry performance as dynamic adaptation.